Successful Fundraising Ideas for Groups and Clubs

Special Occasion Yard Sign Rental Fundraiser Idea

How to create a successful yard sign rental fundraiser for birthdays, graduation, and more!

A special occasion yard sign rental service is a great opportunity for nonprofit organizations like schools, sports clubs, church groups and more to raise funds because the profits can be substantial if you have a great group of volunteers and are willing to put in a little bit of work. And the best part is, special occasion yard announcements are always in demand, which means it’s an easy sell. Most cities throughout the U.S. only have one or two sign rental companies and many are currently booked out weeks in advance. Meaning that they can’t handle all of the orders.

Celebration yard sign service companies place all types of special occasion signs on people’s front yards, putting them on display for everyone to see. No doubt you’ve seen these signs when driving through a neighborhood.

The signs are usually ordered by a family member or a friend who wants to surprise a loved-one with a special celebratory message that may include birthday wishes, anniversary wishes, new baby arrival announcements, graduation announcements, special thank you messages, welcome home messages and much more. The messaging possibilities are endless.

Realtors also rent them for open house and “welcome to your new home” messages. Schools and businesses also rent them for special announcements and messages.

The signs typically include 18” to 24” letters spelling out the message and other fun sign graphics themed to support the message such as balloons, hearts, stars, cakes, presents, etc. The signs are generally made from sheets of high quality 4mm corrugated plastic which makes them waterproof and reusable. If you order signs online for your yard sign service fundraiser, make sure you are ordering corrugated plastic for outdoor use.

How much money can you earn with a special occasion yard sign fundraising service?

As with just about any fundraising opportunity, how much money you make is generally determined by how much work you’re willing to put into it and how many volunteers you have available to help.

Most special occasion yard sign rental companies charge customers anywhere between $80 and $130 for a 24-hour sign rental. This rental includes sign delivery, installation and pickup. Businesses serving larger metropolitan areas usually are able to charge more. As a nonprofit organization trying to raise much needed funds, you should have no problem getting people to pay or donate an amount equal to the going market rate.

If you choose to do just 1 installation a day, you could bring in $2,500 a month or more. Do 3 installations each day and you’re looking at a potential $7,500 per month or more. Install 5 per day, and you could bring in $12,500 or more per month.

The best part about this service is that your product is reusable. Once you purchase your initial signage, you won’t need to restock and replenish your inventory unless your signs suffer damage or you decide to expand and service more homes.

How much does it cost to start a yard sign fundraising service ?

A complete yard sign starter kit can be purchased on Amazon from the Victory Store (or similar company) for around $1,400. This kit should include everything you need as far as your signage goes. Another option is to just purchase letter sets and additional celebration signs separately. This will get you more customization options and you may receive the product quicker. Just search for “birthday yard sign letters” and you should be able to pull up a list of what is available. Just make sure you purchase the plastic signs. Cheaper cardboard signs will not hold up for outdoor use.

Whichever way you decide to go with your initial sign purchase, you’ll probably need to invest between $700 and $1,500 on your initial signage, depending on the volume of signage you want to have on hand. Within a couple of weeks of posting signs, you should have your inventory paid off.

Marketing your yard sign rental business

Building awareness for your yard sign fundraising service is very similar to building awareness for any other fundraising idea. You need to promote it! For this type of fundraiser, it’s important to have a website where you can list all of your yard sign services, which special occasions you offer signs for, and also allow people to place orders. Many of your orders will be coming from friends and relatives who live out of state and are wanting to purchase a sign for someone in your local area because they can’t be there for the big event. If you don’t already have a website, you can easily set one up on platforms like Squarespace or Wix. Be sure to optimize your web pages with language that includes your service area and other key words and phrases relevant to your service. Within a few weeks of having your site pages live and active, Google will step in and start listing you in search results as a local source for celebration yard sign rentals.

Check with your city to see if you will need any special permits or licenses and check with your insurance agent to see what type of liability insurance you will need to carry.